At the end of the 1967 season, the owners of the USA and NPSL clubs scanned their financial statements, some of which were $500,000 in the red, and tried to analyze what had gone wrong with their investments. To soccer fans, had they been asked, the answers were clear. Unfortunately, the entrepreneurs behind the leagues had failed to analyze the market upon which they were about to foist their production. At the time, native-born Americans knew very little about soccer, or its great teams and players. As a result, most Americans failed to understand the games played by the two leagues, finding them slow and boring. Also, the owners had completely overestimated events of the previous summer: while reaction to the 1966 World Cup Final had been positive, large numbers of U.S. sports fans were not about to rush out and buy season tickets in the way they did for, say, baseball. Another miscalculation involved the "ethnic" market: the USA and NPSL assumed this group constituted a ready-made market, waiting to be cultivated. Regrettably-and this fact still escapes businessmen investing in the sport-the ethnic fan is not only very discriminating, easily able to distinguish top notch football from that of the second class variety, but also is inclined only to turn out to see teams or star players from his or her homeland; adding the odd Serb or Portuguese to the roster is not going to ensure their respective community’s attendance at a game-if it did, the ASL would have been a major, national league years earlier. By 1968, it should have been clear to the powers-that-be that a slow track for growth would have to be followed, with an eye towards educating (and entertaining) the American fan, preferably through home-grown stars.

Unfortunately, the owners were not concerned with what the American soccer community thought the problems were. They wanted only a simple explanation for their failure, and they found one. It was not any of the above miscalculations or the brand of soccer offered that had been responsible for the hefty financial losses, they reasoned. Nor was it the hurried planning or numerous high-salaried administrators or "advisers". Neither could it have been the inept recruiting of both players and coaches. No, in their minds it was all too clear that the fault lay in the unnecessary competition of the two leagues, which had diluted the support of the "many" soccer fans: give the country one pro league and attendance would zoom. So, in December 1967, the two leagues merged and formed the North American Soccer League (NASL), taking the original name of the USA group. The NASL had two commissioners, Dick Walsh and Ken Macker, who had each held those posts with the USA and NPSL, respectively.

Out of the 22 franchises in the two leagues, 17 were retained. A certain amount of shuffling of teams was necessary to prevent any two teams from competing against one another for support. As a result, the NPSL’s Chicago franchise moved to Kansas City, and Bill Cox’s Los Angeles franchise relocated to San Diego. Others disbanded to make way: the New York Skyliners folded to make room for the Generals, and the USA’s San Francisco franchise also closed shop to yield to Oakland; the owners of the Golden Gate Gales subsequently purchased controlling interest in the Vancouver club. Two other clubs-Philadelphia and Pittsburgh-simply drowned in a sea of red ink, having lost over $500,000 each.

As late as the middle of the 1967 season, the two sides had been alternately talking about and rejecting plans for a merger. However, it finally came about, in no small part, because of an $18 million antitrust suit which the NPSL had filed against virtually everybody, including the United Soccer Association, USSFA, FIFA, and even the Canadian Football Association, the governing body north of the border. FIFA’s blacklisting of NPSL players was one example of illegality cited. The suit never went to court.

CBS came back for another year, minus the volatile Blanchflower, who was replaced by the more charitable Mario Machado. A few North Americans-thirty in all-were sprinkled amongst the 17 teams, but there were still only 13 native-born Americans; obviously, Chicago Mustangs fell short of its goal of one year earlier, only carrying three on its 18 man roster.

Perhaps recognizing that the talent of a year before left much to be desired, new players were recruited from overseas, including John Kowalik from Poland, the 1968 NASL MVP with 30 goals and 9 assists for Chicago Mustangs, records which stood for a decade. Washington Whips fielded the only one-armed player in NASL history, Victorio Casa of Argentina. As a result of the NPSL’s Philadelphia franchise’s folding, Ruben Navarro was picked up by Cleveland to anchor their defense. San Diego acquired the aging Brazilian star Vava, star of the 1958 and 1962 World Cup Finals. Kansas City’s roster included a backup goalkeeper named Horst Muhlmann, who went on to a distinguished kicking career in the National Football League.

On the coaching front, the legendary Ferenc Puskas-captain of Hungary’s great teams of the early 1950s and a star with Real Madrid later in the decade-was brought in to coach Vancouver Royals, but not without some difficulty. The Royals had already committed to Bobby Robson (later to manage the English national team) but the merger had brought Puskas to Canada, as he had originally been signed to coach the San Francisco club in 1968. With two head coaches, one obviously had to step down, and when Robson was offered the job of assistant to Puskas, he resigned.

If CBS was concerned that Machado would criticize the caliber of play as his predecessor had, it need not have worried: the caliber of play reached a level of quality that would not be seen for another 10 seasons. Touring teams learned this the hard way. Both Cleveland and New York defeated Pelé and his Santos of Brazil team. Manager Malcolm Allison brought his proud Manchester City team-the reigning English First Division champions-and promptly lost to Atlanta Chiefs, 3-2. After the loss, Allison tried to explain away the result, saying it was a freak occurrence and that Atlanta were a fourth-division level side who couldn’t defeat Manchester City again. As fate would have it, a Mexican game city was scheduled to play got called off, so Atlanta challenged Allison to a rematch. While returning from the West Coast-where Manchester lost to Oakland Clippers-Allison took his side back through Atlanta. He lost again, 2-1.

Not every NASL team played so well. Faced with building a club from scratch as a former USA side, Dallas Tornado owners Lamar Hunt and Bill McNutt hired a sly Yugoslav, Bob Kap, as coach. Kap recruited a side of untried amateurs-mostly from England and Holland-and took them on a winter world tour to season them. As it turned out, the winter wasn’t long enough: once the NASL season started, they proved to be hopelessly outclassed, losing their opener to Houston, 6-0, and suffering subsequent defeats of 8-2 and 7-1. After firing Kap, coaching the team themselves for a game, and going through a second coach (Keith Spurgeon of England), Hunt and McNutt and their team finished 2-26-4, setting a standard for failure that has never been approached.

The close of the season found Atlanta winning the Atlantic Division (in spite of only playing 31 games; making up a canceled date with Detroit was deemed unnecessary as it would have had no impact on the standings), Cleveland the Lakes Division, and Kansas City the Gulf Division. The NASL’s scoring system (adopted from the NPSL) caused some controversy, as San Diego (under the direction of "joint coaches" George Curtis and Angel Papadopolus) was awarded the Pacific Division crown by one "bonus point" over Oakland, even though both teams had identical 18-8-6 records. In the best-of-three semifinals, Atlanta and San Diego swept Cleveland and Kansas City, respectively. The championship round was a two-game, total-goals series, as the 1967 NPSL finals had been. Atlanta and the Toros drew 0-0 in San Diego, as league-leading goalkeeper Ataulfo Sanchez starred before the home crowd. In the second leg in Atlanta, goals from Peter McParland, Kaiser Motaung and Delroy Scott gave the Chiefs a 3-0 triumph. Atlanta’s Phil Woosnam was named Coach of the Year, and the Chiefs’ exciting Kaiser "Boy Boy" Motaung took Rookie of the Year honors. Oakland assuaged its being "cheated" out of the playoffs by placing 5 players on the NASL all-star team.

There were no real winners, though. Attendance around the league was a dismal 3,400, well short of the 20,000 required to break even. Within two months of the finals, nearly every team in the league folded: at the November meeting in Chicago to set up the 1969 season, Detroit said they would not be continuing; others soon followed suit. At a meeting on January 7, 1969, Phil Woosnam was given the unenviable task of convincing the 10 remaining owners to continue the soccer "experiment"; five agreed to continue another season. Losses from the first season alone had run to $6 million for the two leagues, and every club saw at least $200,000 go down the drain; St. Louis Stars admitted to losing $1.5 million in their two years of operation. In 1968, continued rental of big stadiums and paying out of huge salaries ended most of the owners interest in soccer for good.

The NASL inaugurated their first season of exhibitions with foreign teams. Besides a major tour by Santos of Brazil, (detailed below), several prominent clubs played against NASL teams. Among the more notable visitors, Manchester United lost a threesome to the Atlanta Chiefs 2-3 and 1-2, and to the oakland Clippers 1-3. Borussia Dortmund defeated the Kansas City Spurs 3-1, America of Mexico lost badly to the San Diego Toros, 5-1, Guadalajara of Mexico tipped the Oakland Clippers 1-0, and Real madrid handily beat the New York Generals 4-1. As in future matches, many of the visiting teams left some of their top players behind, seeing these games mainly as a way of keeping their second string players in shape.

As fall 1967 approached, the ASL endeavored to persevere: earlier that year, interests in Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit and Minnesota were refused permission by the USSFA to join the ASL. Notwithstanding this setback, the ASL went into its 1967-68 season with a twelve-team, two division league. The only noticeable change from the early days was the admission of the Rochester and Washington clubs. The ASL teams still operated on small budgets-New York Inter’s budget was about $50,000 a year-and still had ethnic followings, played in dusty ovals, and had part-time players who performed before small crowds. Edner Breton, later to play for Detroit Cougars in the other league, played a couple of exhibition games for Rochester’s ASL team in 1968. "It was like a bunch of kids playing in a park with no organization whatsoever", he recalled. Ukrainian Nationals of Philadelphia took the 1967-68 ASL crown. ith the demise of the NASL's Detroit Cougars, the ASL started looking seriously at expansion to the Midwest, and began making the first preliminary planning for such a move.

In an apparent concession to the "majors", the ASL announced that it would begin playing a summer season in 1969. As a result, for the first time since its inception, the American Soccer League did not begin a season in September of the year. The 1968-69 season was truncated to become simply the 1968 Fall season. scheduled for 12 games. Some clubs, not content to spend the summer and fall of 1968 idly, staged an "internal season": Washington Darts took the championship. In between the two sessions, five teams folded, while Ludlow moved to Fall River.

The US National Team

The US reorganized the national team for 1970 World Cup Qualifications. The team was coached by Phil Woosnam and assisted by Gordon Jago. With the new coaching staff, who brought a European perspective to the team, and the existence of the NASL, the playing field had changed considerably. For the first time, players were selected by the coach, rather than a selection committee. For the first time in many decades, fully professional players were available, and choices would no longer be made based on geographical location or personal friendships. This, in addition to the fact that they would not face Mexico who qualified automatically as the host, led to high hopes for a return to the World Cup.

The roster drew primarily from the NASL and the German-American League of New York. Notable players included Bob Gansler, Pat McBride, Willy Roy, and Helmut Kofler. They tuned up with three friendlies, their first games in 15 months. The first game in fifteen months saw the US draw against Israel in New York City on September 15, with a goal by Willy Roy and two by Millar. This was followed 13 days later by an embarrassing 0-4 loss to Israel at Philadelphia. Finally, they beat the Rochester Lancers of the ASL 3-2. They looked better with each game.

The US lost their first 1970 World Cup qualified against Canada in a disappointing 2-4 rout at Toronto on October 13. The three game split in Haiti started on October 20 with a 6-3 triumph, with Millar, Albrecht and Roy netting two goals each, but this was followed the next day with a 2-4 loss, and a 0-1 loss two days later. Licking their wounds, the US returned to quickly net three straight qualifying victories, beating Canada 1-0 in Atlanta on October 27, and whomping Bermuda in a home and away series in early November by 6-2 in Kansas City and 2-0 in Hamilton, Bermuda. This left the US with a good chance to qualify for the Cup, with only two games against Haiti in 1969 standing in the way.

New York Greek-Americans of the German-American league retained the cup by beating Chicago Olympic in the two-leg final. After a 1-1 tie in Chicago on July 21, Greek-Americans won the second leg, 1-0, at Eintracht Oval in New York on July 28.

The eastern semifinal had been a clash of former champions, with Greek-Americans ousting Philadelphia Ukrainian Nationals, 2-2 and 1-0. In the west, Chicago Olympic defeated Los Angeles AC, 5-2.

In the NCAA Tournament, the field expanded to 28 teams, with 11 teams receiving a first round bye. In the third round, Brown defeated Army 3-1, Michigan State defeated West Chester 2-2 (game settled by corner kicks), Maryland defeated Hartwick 2-1, and San Jose State defeated Air Force 1-0. In the semifinals, Michigan State defeated Brown 2-0, and Maryland defeated San Jose State 4-3. The championship was held in Atlanta, GA on December 7, and was a hard-fought 2-2 draw which extended into 2 overtimes at which point the game was called and Michigan State and Maryland were declared co-champions.